The Center for Innovative Technology announced the release of the Commonwealth Research and Technology Strategic Roadmap for fiscal year 2015, a comprehensive and ongoing evaluation of the Commonwealth’s research initiatives that identifies strategic technology priorities throughout Virginia, including at its universities, federal labs and other institutions.

The Roadmap is the product of ongoing collaboration from a team that includes Virginia’s private sector, led by the Commonwealth’s ten regional technology councils, its colleges and universities, federal labs and other research organizations, and economic development officials. A broad range of senior executives from industry, academia, federal laboratories, other research organizations, economic development offices, and the Research and Technology Investment Advisory Committee (RTIAC) contribute to this examination of Virginia’s strengths and priorities.

Pete Jobse, CIT President and CEO, said, “If Virginia wants to compete in the global economy, we need to continue investing in research and commercialization, as well as the ecosystem that surrounds innovation. The Roadmap leverages the best minds in the public and private sectors to prioritize these investments to build a foundation for an exciting future in the new Virginia economy.”

The R&T Roadmap was established by the Virginia Assembly in 2011 as a comprehensive planning tool used to identify research areas worthy of economic development and institutional focus in Virginia; industry sectors identified in the Roadmap are considered commercially promising and are expected to drive economic growth across the state. In addition, they guide and prioritize Commonwealth investments in research, such as those by the Commonwealth Research Commercialization Fund (CRCF).

The FY2015 Roadmap identified the following sectors as research and technology strengths and opportunities that represent high-priority industries, subsectors and research disciplines with promising out-year growth.